Customs and passport control. How to pass customs control

Who and how can prevent you from leaving the country, what documents you need to take to cross the border, how to take medicines out of Russia and firearms. Team 29 talks about how to go on vacation or business trip abroad and avoid problems at the border.

Russian border: who works there

Usually this is an airport checkpoint or a vehicle checkpoint. There are border controls and customs in ports, railways There are also pedestrian border crossings.

At the border, you will first be met by employees of the Federal Customs Service (FTS), and then by the border service (a division of the FSB). The former check the contents of your bags, the latter check your passport and at the same time, if necessary, they will climb into your bags again. The first carry out inspection of luggage and draw up declarations for the export of valuables. The latter, as a division of the FSB, have almost unlimited powers.

There are two corridors on the border: green and red. You go through red if you need to declare something. Before traveling, study the full lists of what you need to declare and cannot be taken out of the country. The green corridor is for those who do not need to declare anything.

What are customs officers entitled to?

Inspection

They look at the contents of your bag, but without opening (“breaking the integrity”) of the packages of goods.

customs inspection

They study your luggage, open the packages of goods that you are carrying. For this, unlike personal customs inspection, they do not need permission.

Personal customs inspection

If necessary, they look all the way down to the contents of your pockets. The decision on such an inspection is made only by the head of the customs office and only if the employees of the checkpoint have reason to believe that you are committing an offense: for example, you are taking something that cannot be taken out of the country. You must be notified in writing of the inspection. During the inspection, an act is drawn up in two copies, one of which is yours. You have the right to enter any comments in the act.

Administrative detention

If, in the opinion of the customs officers, you have committed an administrative offense within their competence - for example, you did not declare some goods - you will be detained for up to three hours to draw up a protocol on the offense and up to 48 hours to establish your identity or clarify the circumstances of the offense.

What are border guards entitled to?

Personal search and search of things

Examine the contents of your bags, suitcases, pockets of your clothes. To do this, the border guards must have a reasonable suspicion that you have committed an offense.

Administrative detention

If you have violated the state border regime, then you are detained for no more than three hours to draw up a protocol and no more than 48 hours to establish your identity and clarify the circumstances of the offense.

Before crossing the border

Prepare documents for crossing the border

For yourself: foreign passport, diplomatic passport or sailor's passport, permission to export valuables, pre-prepared declarations (if necessary, see below).

For a child: a passport. There is an exception: if your passport was issued before 03/01/2010, then information about the child can be recorded in it. The child himself can then leave the country with a birth certificate. If you are not traveling with your child, then you need a notarized consent to leave the country from at least one of the parents.

Find out if you need to declare something when leaving Russia and fill out a customs declaration in advance

When leaving Russia, some goods and valuables must be declared. Full list you can see these things. Study it carefully. If you find any of your belongings on this list, fill out a declaration in advance. Do not forget that with the declaration you must follow the red corridor.

Blank declaration forms are always available at the customs point, where you can fill it out. But it is better to do everything in advance. The declaration form can be found.

It is not difficult to enter information into it: opposite the corresponding line, you must put an “X” sign. It is better to describe all declared goods in detail: what, what it is made of, color, manufacturer, weight, shape, etc. You must also indicate the quantity and cost of each product in any currency.

Find out if there are travel restrictions

You can find out if you have debts on the website of the Federal Bailiffs Service. Due to debt, you do not automatically become restricted to travel abroad. Contact the bailiff and find out what restrictions have been imposed on you. If you know that there is a debt, then you should pay it off as soon as possible. It often happens that a person distributes debts before leaving, but they still do not let him out at the border, because the bailiff does not yet know about the repayment of the debt. It takes about two weeks to update the information.

why they may not be released from Russia

You have access to state secrets;

You work for the FSB;

you serve in armed forces RF;

You are doing alternative civilian service;

You do not have a criminal record;

You have debts for fines, duties, alimony in the amount of more than 10 thousand rubles;

You are bankrupt.

What can not be exported from Russia

You can't at all:

Rare endangered plants and animals, products from them;

Materials of extremist content;

pornography for sale;

Items made of precious metals are more expensive than $25,000;

More than 250 grams of sturgeon and caviar from them without a check;

Carriers with information constituting a state secret.

How to get permission to export valuables, medicines, weapons and a car

Piece of art

Go to a subdivision of the Ministry of Culture of your region or a special expert institution with the right to issue permits (for example, in St. Petersburg it is located on Bolshaya Morskaya). Take with you a photo of your work of art, details of its exact dimensions, author and year of creation, and your passport. Write an application for permission to export. You must be given a certificate that the sculpture (painting, engraving, etc.) is not national treasure and it can be taken abroad. Help will cost you about 1000 rubles for one work.

Weapon

Contact the district department of internal affairs with a weapon and a license for it. Write an application for a license to export weapons. If we are talking about hunting or sporting weapons, then you must also show an invitation to hunt or competition.

Money

If you are exporting more than $10,000, this money will need to be declared when leaving the country.

Automobile

Provide documents for the vehicle, a driver's license, and if you drive a car without its owner - a notarized power of attorney with the right to export the car abroad.

How can you be prevented from leaving the country

Option 1: The court decides to close the exit due to debts and passes it to the bailiff, or the latter himself makes such a decision. He notifies the border guards, the department of the Ministry of Internal Affairs for migration (the former FMS) and the debtor about the restriction.

Option 2: You can be in the database of the Ministry of Internal Affairs "Rozysk-magistral". If this is the case, then when crossing the border you may be subjected to additional screening and detention. Moreover, the security forces know in advance that you are going to travel whether you should buy a train or plane ticket.

Option 3: One or more pages may be quietly removed from your passport, after which it automatically becomes invalid. Moreover, you can also be fined for trying to cross the border with invalid documents.

Serious difficulties can arise at the airport. After customs control, you enter the sterile zone. Neither the media, nor your relatives, nor a lawyer can get there. You find yourself in the boundless power of the security forces.

If possible, inform your friends and relatives that you are being detained at the border. Be careful: the security forces can take away your smartphone when you type a message, and thus gain access to the information on the device.

Write a claim or statement to the head of the customs department or border point. Refused, they said that everything is legal? Contact the court.

Customs officers can selectively check any passenger. You need to be prepared to document compliance with the restrictions on duty-free importation of goods for personal use.

During the period of seasonal sales, many Russians went shopping abroad, hoping to take advantage of not only discounts, but also tax free (VAT refund when exporting goods), as well as duty-free import of goods purchased for personal use. Recall that upon arrival in Russia from abroad, you can import goods without a written declaration (passing through the green corridor is the so-called conclusive declaration) and without paying customs duties goods, the total value of which does not exceed €10,000 upon import by air and €1,500 when imported by other means of transport, and/or whose total weight does not exceed 50 kg per person.

Accordingly, for a family, for example, of three people, the above limits are tripled. If, nevertheless, the cost of purchases exceeded the duty-free quota, a single rate is applied in terms of such excess customs duties, taxes in the amount of 30% of the customs value of these goods, but not less than €4 per 1 kg. That is, if you bought things, for example, for €12,000 without excess weight, then customs payments must be paid for goods worth €2,000. To determine the cost, checks for goods purchased abroad are used.

In order not to take into account the things that were with the citizen at the time of his departure from the country in the above duty-free quota, they can be declared in the passenger declaration as temporarily exported goods. You should not go to extremes and declare all things, it is enough to indicate the most expensive ones (jewelry, watches, laptops, video cameras, Cell phones and so on.). The passenger declaration is filled in in two copies: one remains at customs, the other - with the passenger. In this case, when leaving, you should go through the “red” corridor, submit a passenger declaration to the customs officer and receive from him your copy with a mark on passing customs control. The passenger will be able to show this copy to the customs officer on the way back, in case of last questions to comply with the duty-free import quota.

Customs checks

It should also be remembered that Russia has concluded bilateral agreements and memoranda on customs cooperation with many countries, which ensure effective interaction, including in the fight against smuggling and administrative customs offenses.

In particular, with regard to goods transported individuals from the EU countries, the exchange of information has been established and has been taking place promptly for several years.

After a foreign customs stamp is stamped on the payment documents (checks) necessary for the application of the “tax free” system (VAT refund), information about the purchase and the passenger is transferred to the Russian customs. During the flight, Russian customs officers have time to process this information and, when passing through customs control, meet those passengers whose purchases abroad, based on the amount of VAT for which they applied for a refund, exceed the established limit.

If such passengers went along the green corridor, and not along the red one, with the provision of a passenger declaration and payment of customs duties, then this violation is qualified as non-declaration in the prescribed form. In addition to the payment of customs duties, it entails the imposition of an administrative fine on citizens in the amount of one second to two times the value of the goods that are objects administrative offense, with their confiscation or without it, or confiscation of objects of an administrative offense. The decision to confiscate goods can only be taken by a court.

If the amount of unpaid customs payments exceeds 2 million rubles, and the passenger has also taken steps to conceal the purchased goods, including by giving them the appearance of second-hand goods (direct intent), then he can be held criminally liable under Article 194 of the Criminal Code for evading customs payments.

This crime is punishable by a fine in the amount of 300,000 to 500,000 rubles or in the amount of wages or other income of the convicted person for a period of two to three years, or by forced labor for up to five years with deprivation of the right to hold certain positions or engage in certain activities for a term of up to three years or without it, or by deprivation of liberty for a term of up to five years with deprivation of the right to hold certain positions or engage in certain activities for a term of up to three years or without it.

Customs officers may conduct controls on other passengers on a selective basis. Therefore, even if you did not apply to a foreign customs office to put marks for a VAT refund, you still need to be prepared to confirm with documents (checks, passenger declaration) compliance with the restrictions on duty-free import of goods for personal use. The above risks may also occur if the duty-free import limits are not violated, but as part of such a check, the customs officer concludes that the imported goods are not intended for personal use, but are a commercial consignment for subsequent sale or use in other commercial activities. For example, there is a known case when such a conclusion was made in relation to condoms, which one citizen imported in such quantity that, taking into account the expiration date indicated on them, he could not use it with all his will.

Passport control pass on the foreign passport. If you are a member of public service, you may need to present various other certificates: a sailor's passport, a diplomatic passport and other documents. For those who cross the border with children, it is imperative to take birth certificates or foreign passports for each of the children. Children also need permission to travel from their parents. According to the requirements of some countries, this document is required even if the family is traveling as a whole.

Russian passport control

Passport control is carried out by the immigration police and security services. During the check, the officer first looks to see if your passport is genuine, and then finds out your identity and checks it against databases. Security personnel may ask additional questions, which are different in Russia from those asked abroad.

Passport control in Russia finds out your identity, checks the photo on your passport with your appearance, and also checks if there are any circumstances that prevent you from traveling abroad. These may include a travel ban on duty, various orders from tax bailiffs, non-payment of alimony, and others. The presence of seals about the intersection is also very carefully checked. Russian borders for previous trips. Russian security officials usually do not care about visas and how you cross the borders of other states, but if you have something wrong with Russian stamps, this will raise questions.

Foreign passport control

The security services of other countries, accordingly, are not interested in your affairs with the Russian state. They only care about how correct you are in relation to their countries or commonwealths. For example, if you enter the Schengen area, then the officer can count the days of your stay in Europe, and if there are more of them, refuse you entry. It will also be checked to see if you have unliquidated obligations for violations in the territories of other countries during previous visits. If you have violated the rules of the road, but did not pay the receipt, this may be the basis for a ban on entry.

If a migration card is required to enter the country, then it is filled out before passing through passport control at the entrance to this country. Usually, migration card blanks are freely available in the same room where the checkpoints are located. It is not uncommon for people to fill out migration boxes while they are waiting in line, and often cards are handed out on planes, trains and buses shortly before arrival.

Foreign passport control also checks your visa. You may be asked to show return tickets, hotel reservations, reasons for staying in the country and other questions that clarify the purpose of your visit. In case of suspicion, the passport control officer can take you to a separate office, where he will have a conversation with you, on the basis of which he will decide whether to let you into the country. If this happens, then do not be nervous, answer the questions calmly and honestly. If everything is in order with your documents, then the employee usually has no reason not to give you an entry stamp.

Things to Remember

Keep in mind that the passport control procedure is sometimes delayed due to queues. At some major airports, at peak times, it can last 4-5 hours. This is a rarity, but it is necessary to lay an additional one to two hours to pass the control.

A passport is a very important document proving the identity of every person. It should be received by absolutely all citizens who have reached the age of 14. Citizen's passport Russian Federation has an individual number and series.
There are situations when you just need to check this data, for example, you decide to purchase property. In order not to fall for the "bait" of scammers, you need to check the authenticity of the passport. Also, such information may be needed by banks when applying for a loan. Such information can be obtained from the Federal Migration Service without leaving home.

Instruction

For more information, please contact the branch migration service with your identity document, where you will be asked to fill out an application for this and indicate the reason that prompted you to perform this operation.
After the application, within a few days, at your request, information will be given to you personally in your hands.

Passport control is a mandatory procedure when crossing state borders. The process doesn't take long. But in order not to miss your flight, it is better to know in advance how to go through passport control at the airport.

When crossing the Russian border

Passport control includes checking documents that give you the right to fly to another country. Depending on the visited documents may be different. The common thing is the presence of a valid passport, but other documents may be required. For example, the presence of a Schengen visa for the countries of the Schengen agreement.

If only the mother is traveling with the employee, the employee has the right to ask to show a notarized permission from the father to take the child out of the country.

The passport control officer may ask you for a return ticket confirming your intention to return to the country, or ask you to show your hotel reservations.

Do not forget that at passport control they check whether bailiffs are forbidden to leave the country for you.

If everything is in order, you will be given a departure stamp.

More information about the documents can be found in the embassies of Russia, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation, travel agencies. Be sure to check for the latest rule changes, which happen quite often.

Upon returning to the territory of the Russian Federation, passport control is not so strict. You just put a stamp on the entry back without further questions.

When crossing a foreign border

What documents will be checked and what the passport control officer in another country will ask you upon arrival depends on the agreements between the states. Please check all requirements in advance. Some countries, for example, require a passport, which expires no later than six months after the trip. If even 5 months are left until the expiration date of your passport, and you arrived for 2 weeks, the airport employee has the right to refuse you entry.

Russia has agreements on visa-free stay with many states. This means that you can visit the specified country without a tourist visa. But you will be asked to fill out a special document, such as an immigration card.

If the visa is not a tourist visa, you may be asked for a whole package of documents. For example, with a work visa, they will ask for a work permit. Or if the visa is educational, they will ask for documents from the educational institution.

They may inquire about the purpose of the trip, also ask to show return tickets and hotel reservations, confirm availability Money sufficient to stay in the country. In the absence of documents, you may be denied entry. If everything is in order, they will take your photo and put a stamp on arrival indicating the date of arrival and the latest date of departure.

When flying back to Russia, you simply put a departure stamp in your passport, and also check whether the period of stay in the country has been exceeded. If yes, then be prepared to pay a fine.

Often passport control officers do not ask to show everything required documents but don't rely on luck. It is at passport control that passengers are denied entry or exit. Better to have a little more papers with you, and they will not be useful to you, than you will miss your plane.

Many inexperienced travelers before the trip are very concerned about the question of how to get through customs at the airport. Without knowing the basic rules, it is very difficult to correctly pass customs control, because it involves filling out a declaration, passing a personal inspection, etc.

Not everyone needs to go through customs at the airport, most passengers go through the internal green corridor without filling out any declarations.

Initially, it is worth analyzing in detail all the processes associated with flying to another country. Each citizen who intends to fly to another state in 2019 undergoes the following procedures at the airport:

• Flight check-in.
• Luggage check-in.
• Passage of customs control.
• Passport control.
• Passage of security control.

It is advisable to arrive at the airport at least 3-4 hours before the expected departure. The fact is that check-in for the flight begins three hours before departure.

Therefore, a person during this time will need not only to go through all the controls, but also to find his flight on the scoreboard in order to know exactly where to apply for registration. It ends 30-40 minutes before the expected departure.

Even if a person is late for check-in by only five minutes, he will no longer be able to board the aircraft.

Customs officers can refuse to fly a person even for the most innocuous reasons, for example, due to outstanding fines in the traffic police or unpaid alimony, a loan. Therefore, it is advisable to pay off all debts before departure so that there are no questions at customs.

Passage of customs control

It is necessary to go through customs at the airport with all documents (foreign passport, permission to enter another country, health certificates if necessary). You must have a passport valid for at least six months.

Passage of customs control in Frankfurt am Main

Permitted goods without completing the declaration:

1. Cash up to $10,000.
2. - up to three liters.
3. - no more than two blocks.
4. Items for personal use, the total value of which does not exceed two thousand dollars.

Travelers pass along the red corridor, who carry with them:

• Cash in excess of $10,000. In this case, the currency of the transported funds does not play any role. If the amount converted into dollars is more than 10,000, then it is subject to declaration.
• Jewelry worth over $25,000.
• Securities.
• Items for personal use that are prohibited. For example, weapons or medicines. Weapons require a special permit. In the case of medicines, the country where the person is sent plays a huge role. So, it is forbidden to import even the most harmless medicines like Paracetamol and Analgin into Asian countries. Only medicines that are necessary for a person to maintain life are allowed to be imported. But in this case, the drugs must have a prescription, as well as a doctor's report with a diagnosis, which confirms that these drugs are vital for a person.
• Plants or animals that are listed in the Red Book.
• Documents, materials, the content of which is classified as a state secret.

If the departure is from Russia, you should pay attention that the following groups of goods will be subject to mandatory declaration:

1. Fish, seafood weighing more than five kilograms.
2. Caviar sturgeon fish. It is allowed to export duty-free only up to 250 grams of caviar.
3. Weapon.
4. Ammunition.
5. Explosives.
6. cultural values ​​of the country.
7. State awards of the Russian Federation.

Remember that it is advisable to turn off mobile phones during customs control.

If you need to fill out a declaration, you must approach the airport staff in advance and ask for a form. The declaration is filled in block letters in two copies. One copy is given to the customs control officers, and the second one is kept by the traveler.

In no case should you throw away the declaration even after boarding the aircraft. Upon return, it is presented to the airport staff.

It is not recommended to be nervous during the passage of customs control, because this may cause additional inspections by the airport staff. It is recommended to behave calmly so as not to arouse unnecessary suspicion.

Passport control

The customs officer enters the traveler's personal details. If there is no exit ban, then the person is sent to a security check, and then to a free zone, from where they board the aircraft directly.